


Basement Full of Ghosts

by Hamimifk (BatchSan)



Category: Thir13en Ghosts (2001), Trick 'r Treat (2008)
Genre: Crossover, Explicit Language, Gen, Horror, Murder, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-26
Updated: 2012-10-26
Packaged: 2017-11-17 01:44:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/546257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BatchSan/pseuds/Hamimifk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Halloween night is the perfect night for a ghost hunt beneath the rubble of a home once made of glass.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Basement Full of Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Undead Big Bang](http://undeadbigbang.livejournal.com).

The last rays of afternoon had just faded behind the top of the woods, which was infinitely creepier looking in the dark. Four figures walked along the edge of the woods, keeping clear of the deepening shadows beyond the trees. 

"I really don't like this," one of the figures said, a young man with large brown eyes that nervously darted back and forth between the path before him and the woods.

"Chill man," another of the figures said, slapping the first on the shoulder. "It's Halloween, so there's nothing scarier out there then some idiot kids with rubber chainsaws jumping out at passerbys. Pretending to hack away and you. Right, _Hack_?"

Hack looked back at the two figures, frowning at the emphasis on his name. "Haha, Wally."

Wally grinned easily. "Not my fault your parents hated you."

"Fuck off. They didn't hate me."

"Right, because normal, loving parents call their kid _'Hack'_ just for the hell of it?"

"Seriously you two," the fourth figure finally spoke up. "Are you going to get into this fight again?"

A flashlight beam swung toward the back of the small group, illuminating the face of a light caramel-skinned young man. His dark brown hair, flopped slightly over a green eye as he turned his face away from the light with a scowl.

"Why do you always lag behind like you're waiting to break out into a sprint the first sign some shit starts going down?" Wally asked, lowering his flashlight. "Are you scared of the dark like this pansy too?"

"I'm not afraid of the dark, and why do you always change the topic when people point out your bullshit?"

"Tch, whatever man. Stop tagging along like a lost puppy looking for some handouts."

"Fuck you, Wally."

"Not in your wildest dreams, Alfster."

"It's Alfie, you prick."

"Whatever."

"It's up ahead guys!" Hack said, pointing with his flashlight up the old, fading path they had been following. 

"I can't see jackshit up ahead," Wally whined. "Are you sure?"

"Just shut your bitching mouth and keep up."

Hack broke out into a jog, his long, athletic legs quickly leaving the others behind. When the others caught up to him a few minutes later, he had long since folded up his map and put it away. He was now walking around a large overgrown tangle of foliage and what was clearly once man-made items trapped beneath. The other men stood uncertainly at one edge of the overgrowth until Hack met up with them.

"What is this place?" the nervous young man asked, sweeping his flashlight over the mess.

"This, Martin, is the remains of a supposedly haunted house," Wally grinned, kicking what appeared to have once been part of a bedpost, or possibly a sofa arm.

"Yeah?" If possible, Martin's voice sounded more nervous than he already looked.

"Yeah," Wally answered, sticking his flashlight beneath his chin to cast eerie shadows on his face. "Once upon a time, a crazy dude with too much money and time on his hands built a house out here made of glass."

"Glass? Why would he do that?"

"'Cause he was crazy and rich, why else? Anyway, he supposedly had all this fancy and expensive shit in here, but the real gem of the place was supposedly the basement. They said he had a special treasure down there."

"Special?"

"Super special. They say he kept a collection of ghosts down there in neat little glass cells like some kind of fucked up knickknack collection."

"Now I know you're fucking with me," Martin laughed uneasily. "Ghosts don't exist. Right guys?"

He turned to Hack and Alfie, but they remained solemn and silent, only offering him a slight shrug, intenstifying the uneasiness in Martin's stomach. He turned to find Wally grinning like some kind of deranged Jack-O-Lantern, his red-orange hair further helping to paint the visual.

"Scared yet?" he asked, leaning closer to Martin.

"No." It was hard to hide the audible gulp that followed.

"You should be, because according to the story, they say the ghosts are still here, trapped still in the basement beneath the rubble of the glass house."

Martin whimpered, sidestepping away from the overgrowth. "Bullshit. What happened to the house anyway?"

"About fourteen years ago," Alfie cut in, "the rich guy died and left the house to a relative - a nephew or something. When the guy moved in with his family, a lot of weird shit happened and by the end of the night, the house had caved in on itself, glass blown to shit. The guy and his family just barely escaped with their lives."

"They say the guy's uncle was involved in some dark magic stuff and that's why he had the ghosts," Hack added, surveying the area. "So, are we going to start doing this or what?"

"Doing what?" Alfie asked.

"Ghost hunting," Wally answered, throwing down the heavy bag he had been lugging along the whole time. From within, he pulled out several large spades and gloves and began passing them out.

"Are we going ghost hunting or stopping to do some gardening?" Hack asked, turning over the spade in his hand.

"Fuck you. Shovels are heavy to lug around, especially four at once. If you don't like it, you should've brought along the supplies yourself."

Hack bit his lip and slid the gloves on, not looking happy about it. Once they were in place, he slid the spade into his belt and began picking his way through the undergrowth with Wally in tow. Martin and Alfie exchanged uncertain looks before following, pulling on their gloves as they went. They split apart and began picking up ruined debris. Much were items that had clearly once been highly valuable but had long since fallen to ruins in the face of the elements. Occasionally the overgrowth of grass, weeds, and ivies were too much and they had to use their spades to hack away some of it to continue their search for some sign of an entrance to the basement. After a half hour or so, sweating and tired, Alfie wiped his face on his shirt, freezing at the sound of a howl in the not-so-far distance.

"You guys hear that?"

"Yeah, some bitch has an itch. What about it?" Wally asked, not looking up from the wooden chest he had found a part of.

"Doesn't sound like any dog I've ever heard..."

Martin sighed loudly and threw his spade down. "Look, this is stupid. Does anyone even know what we're looking for here?"

"We're looking for stairs or something, obviously," Wally said, abandoning his useless find to smirk at Martin. "Tired already?"

Shaking his head, Martin gestured wildly. "It's Halloween. We should be at a Halloween party, getting so wasted we won't remember our names at the end of the night. Instead we're here on some imaginary ghost hunt looking like a bunch of kids in a fucked up sandbox."

"Come on, it's just for fun," Hack said lightheartedly.

"Leave the little dipshit alone. If he's scared, let him go home and spend the rest of the night under his covers."

"Seriously, fuck you, Wally."

Huffing, Martin set off and got a few steps before they all heard a loud crack and then he was gone, his scream cutting through the otherwise silent night like a knife. Alfie, Hack, and Wally moved quickly to the spot their friend had last been standing at. What they found was a medium-sized, jagged hole that fell away from the debris and overgrowth. Hack quickly shone his flashlight into the hole, all expecting the worst. The light bit through the dark to find... nothing. They leaned forward in confusion, looking for Martin, when suddenly his face popped into view from the shadows making the three friends topside jump - Wally screaming in his surprise.

"You guys need to get down here right away!" Martin said, his voice excited. His face disappeared but came back into view a second later. "And I heard that, Wally."

Alfie and Hack smirked at the redhead who was now red-faced in embarassment. He scowled and swept a hand through his short, spiky hair. "The little prick..." he growled and bent to move some of the debris away from the hole. Alfie and Hack chuckled before bending to help him.

It took a few moments but they finally managed to uncover part of a small staircase that was apart of one they had been looking for. The rest of the staircase had fallen away or was trapped beneath rubble, it was hard to tell which one exactly in the dark. They didn't have much to work with to get safely down into the hole, but there was just enough footholds if they managed to proceed with some careful footing. Wally went down first, moving to the side when he got to the bottom so he could sweep his flashlight's beam around the area. Hack followed while Alfie hesitated beside the hole, feeling uneasy for the first time the whole night. There was another howl from the woods, sounding louder and closer than the last, and with a deep breath, he climbed down quickly to join his friends who were peering around in search of Martin.

"Where'd that idiot go?"

Hack nodded at what appeared to be a corridor in front of them. Despite the debris from where the hole had occurred, the rest of the basement appeared to be in relatively okay shape, which helped them pick out several narrow corridors that branched out from where they stood. One was partially blocked off by likely what had been the rest of the staircase, but still possibly passable if they moved some of the rubble away. It didn't look disturbed though and all but the one directly ahead of where the stairs ended seemed to be cobweb-free. Dropping their spades and gloves on the stairs, they set off down it and followed it to another cross-section. This time they only had three choices, and one was the way they had just come from. 

"Should we split up?" Alfie asked, shining his flashlight back and forth between the two corridors.

"Fuck no. Don't you ever watch horror movies? We split up and then get picked off one-by-one by some wacko with a real chainsaw."

"You sound kind of scared, Wally," Alfie teased.

"That's like saying werewolves are real!" Hack scoffed. "This is real life, and that type of shit doesn't really happen, especially in a place that no one's been to in fourteen years."

"Whatever to the both of you. All I'm saying is that it's stupid to split up." Taking a deep breath, Wally shouted, "Yo, Martin! Where are you?"

They fell silent, listening. When they got no answer, Alfie sighed. "Let's just pick a corridor and kick his ass when we find him," he suggested.

"Agreed," Wally said quickly and headed down one of the corridors with the other two on his heels.

"So I haven't really wanted to say anything about it, but has anyone else noticed everything around us is glass except for like the old support pillars for the building?" Hack pointed out.

They looked around, really taking in their surroundings. Beneath the years of dirt, seemed to lie thick, heavy glass whenever they passed their hands at. Some of it appeared thin and easily breakable in some places but when they pressed against it, it held up just fine. It was strange to see proof that the glass house had once existed, a local story that they had been too young to remember, but possibly it was stranger that the basement had managed to survive the years rather unscathed. Making a sudden right, they found Martin standing rather dumbfounded in the center of the corridor, his brown eyes larger than normal behind a pair of clear glasses. Wally marched directly up to him and flicked him on the forehead in annoyance.

"What the hell's your problem, man? Didn't you hear us calling you?"

"No," Martin said, not reacting to the flick. His eyes were still too dark and even larger than they normally were as they stared ahead at one of the walls.

"What's with the glasses?" Hack asked. "You don't wear glasses."

Absently reaching up, the younger man brushed his finger along the arm of the glasses. "Found them," he answered absently.

"Dude, what the hell are you looking at?"

At this he slowly turned his face toward them, his dark skin significantly lighter than it should be, eyes displaying something distant, It was almost as if Martin's brain had stepped out for lunch and left his body on autopilot. With a slow hand, he reached up and pulled off the glasses and stretched out his arm toward the trio of confused young men. His head turned back to the wall, focusing back on the spot his flashlight beam was still aimed at. Hesitantly, Alfie reached out and took the glasses from the outstretched and deathly still hand. He gave a nervous laugh and slipped them on, mouth opening to make a comment about this being a really shitty way to try and scare them. His gaze followed Martin's and he too froze when he finally realized what his friend had been staring at.

"Okay, stop that," Wally said, his voice laced with an edge of nervousness. "What are you two playing at?"

He pushed past Alfie and grabbed Martin's shoulders, attempting to shake him out of his stupor. "Seriously, this isn't funny. Stop staring at the fucking wall like some space-case."

Alfie had enough sense to snap out of his surprise and tapped on the redhead's shoulder, slipping the glasses off and holding them out to him. Frowning, Wally took the glasses but didn't put them on, instead electing to push Alfie away, who stumbled slightly and fell into Hack.

"For someone who was so gung-ho about coming here tonight, you're sure as shit acting like a fucking coward," Hack said angrily, righting Alfie who nodded his thanks. 

"I just don't like that these two dipshits are trying to fake me out like this." Gesturing at the glasses, Wally held them up. "And what the fuck is up with these glasses? Or that fucking wall? Like I'm really supposed to be scared of them?"

"Put them on," Martin firmly said. This surprised Wally, who turned around to find the shorter young man looking at him with those distant, brown eyes. He reached out to try and push Martin, but the younger man dodged his hand and slammed himself into the redhead, a wild fire lighting up in his eyes. "Put them on," he repeated, his voice rising despite whatever shock he had previously been in.

"I'm not gonna play along with the little 'freak-out-Wally' game you have going on with Alf the Alien," Wally growled, succeeding this time in shoving him away.

"It's Alfie, you fucktard, and seriously, put on the fucking glasses so you can see we're not playing any kind of fucking games here. There's something there," he said, pointing at the wall where Martin had previously been staring.

"No, this is a bunch of bullshit."

With that, Wally dropped the glasses to the floor and raised his foot to stomp on them. Before he could bring his foot all the way up, Alfie tackled him, headbutting him in the nose as they slammed down to dirty floor. A trickle of blood began to run down Wally's cheek from his nose as he laid there for a moment, slightly dazed. It was Hack who retrieved the glasses from the floor and slipped them on, cursing at the redhead's stupidity. He looked around for a moment, sweeping his flashlight around until it slid against the opposite wall the one Martin and Alfie had been staring at and pausing.

"Fuck me sideways," he breathed.

"Not you too, you sick fuck," Wally groaned, sitting up when Alfie had scrabbled away quickly to avoid any retribution from the redhead. "Wasn't it the other wall with the weird shit?"

Hack's flashlight swept over to the other wall quickly and he cursed loudly, dropping the flashlight. Ripping the glasses off his face, he threw them onto the floor and stepped away completely from the small group, stumbling over his own feet so that he fell onto his ass with a heavy whoosh of breath.

"What?" Alfie asked, retrieving the fallen flashlight and handing it back to Hack.

Reluctantly, he took it back but kept the beam focused on the middle of the corridor, refusing to look up at the walls. "There's two of... whatever the fuck those are."

"You're shitting me..." Alfie said, grabbing the glasses off the floor and sliding them back on. He lit up the wall Hack had first looked at and grew pale. 

Wally, having pulled himself up, snatched the glasses off of Alfie's face and slid them on, ready to confront this mindfuck game his friends were playing head-on. Nothing appeared different until he looked at the wall where Martin had been staring at and stopped cold. He realized that the wall wasn't just a wall, it was part of a glass cell, and in the center of the cell stood a tall, black man with large railroad spikes jutting out of his body every which way. One of his hands had been cut off at the wrist and replaced crudely with the top of an old-fashioned mallet. He was clearly dead, yet he sneered at Wally in something that clearly stated he was annoyed, raising his mallet to his chest in warning.

"What...?" he started weakly, letting the question die off as his brain struggled to find an explanation for what he was seeing.

"Prick," Alfie grumbled. "Look at the other wall now."

Turning reluctantly, the redhead looked at where Alfie's flashlight was illuminating the glass wall. It appeared to be another cell with another grotesque looking man standing inside, looking even more annoyed than the other. His face was gray, skin torn away where bullets had ripped it away. He was a towering, too-thin man, his clothing filthy and just as bullet-riddled as his face. Wally's throat clenched when the man didn't so much as cast angry, dead eyes at him, as he looked at him like he was deciding exactly which limb of his to start ripping off and how much he was going to enjoy hearing him scream. There was a warm flood in Wally's jeans as he tore the glasses off his face and let them fall at his feet, landing in the puddle he had just created.

"This is impossible," he stammered.

"Did you just piss yourself?" Hack asked, illuminating the spot where the glasses had fallen and quickly scrambling to his feet as if he was at risk of the puddle spilling toward him.

"What the hell is that?" Wally asked, ignoring his accident. 

"I think the ghost hunt was a success," Alfie said grimly, looking uncomfortably over his shoulder. "We should get the hell out of here."

"Yeah," Martin agreed, though there was something unsteady in the way he looked around. No one seemed to notice his odd behavior before he began walking the opposite direction from where the others had come from.

"Where are you going?" Hack asked the retreating back of his friend.

He didn't answer, simply making a left at the end of the corridor and disappearing from sight. Sighing, Hack made to go after him but was stopped by a freckled hand on his arm. Looking into the redhead's face, he almost smirked at the terrified, yet angry look on his features. 

"Where are you going?" Wally asked, his brow furrowing.

"After Martin. What's your problem?"

"What's my problem? What's your problem? We should be getting the fuck out of here."

Shrugging the redhead off his arm, Hack rubbed a hand over his short, dark hair and took on the tone of someone talking to a bratty little kid. "We're not going to leave Martin down here. He could get hurt."

"Fuck Martin. If the dipshit wants to get lost down here, then let him."

"We came down here as a group and we're going to leave here as one," Hack insisted, pushing past Wally.

The redhead watched Hack disappear down the corridor where Martin had went before turning his gaze over to Alfie. Still looking over his shoulder uncomfortably at the wall, the caramel-skinned young man didn't say a word as Wally clicked his tongue and turned to make for the exit realizing his 'friends' were a couple of useless assholes. It was then that there was a loud roar of perhaps machinery from somewhere further in the basement, the ground rumbling slightly in its wake. In the distance, someone screamed. Alfie started and looked down the corridor where his friends had disappeared before casting a glance back at Wally. Shaking his head vehemently, the redhead was already stepping backward from him.

"No. Fuck no. Whatever is down that way is bad shit. Let's take our asses out of here."

A smile twitched at the corners of Alfie's mouth. "Scared, Wally?"

He didn't give him a chance to answer as he pivoted on his heel and ran off after his friends. Swearing loudly, Wally looked uncomfortably around, knowing that he could easily just retrace his steps and get the hell out of there, but there was a knot of guilt in his chest. Even worst then that was the simple fact that he didn't want to be alone right now. Having enough of a mind to scoop up the glasses he'd dropped into his own piss, Wally hastily wiped them off on his jeans and went after his friends.

"Hack? Martin?" Alfie called, ignoring the pounding footsteps coming up behind him. "Where are you guys?"

"Shit man, you couldn't wait up for me?" Wally gasped, panting heavily.

"I thought you were going to leave?" Alfie smirked, not looking at the other young man. "Martin? Hack? Come on guys!" he called.

"Except for Hack, you and that other little idiot would get yourself killed down here without me." 

Scoffing, Alfie turned back to Wally, illuminating his face with his flashlight. "You think a little too highly of yourself, asshole. Just admit you're scared and didn't want to look like a complete chicken-shit by leaving us behind."

Wally opened his mouth to speak but whatever he was about to say was cut off by him suddenly being lifted into the air and being thrown down the corridor a good ten feet from where he'd just been standing. The flashlight and glasses he had been holding in his hands clattered to the floor near Alfie. With wide eyes, he didn't even think as he picked the glasses up and placed them on his face, his own flashlight quickly sweeping around to find the cause of his friend's sudden flying act. No more than four feet away from Alfie stood a grotesquely obese man with what looked like diapers and a bib on and nothing else. He looked away from Wally's sprawled figure to look at Alfie. They locked eyes for a long minute before the obese man brought the axe up in his hand. 

Body going into autopilot, Alfie leapt away just as the axe swung into the wall behind where he'd just been standing. He didn't turn around as he dashed over to the redhead and tugged his arm up roughly. For a second, all he got was a groan but he swiftly kicked Wally's ribs, making him curse and glare up him. Not saying anything, Alfie yanked Wally to his feet and winced as something heavy and sharp grazed the back of his leg. Blessedly, nothing was severed, but there was now a draft on the back of his calf where the denim of his jeans had been sliced away.

"Run!" he yelled at the still swearing redhead.

Stumbling, the pair took off, zig-zagging through two or three corridors before they slammed into Hack, all of them tumbling to the floor as a glass panel slid from nowhere behind them, closing off the corridor they'd just been racing down.

"Ow!" Hack said, rubbing his shoulder where he bumped it on the ground in the fall. "What's going on?"

Alfie pawed the glasses off his face and threw them at Hack, pointing at the glass panel. "There was a ghost after us!"

"A ghost? One of those guys we saw?" Hack frowned. 

"No! It was some fat guy with a fucking axe! Which makes this shit a lot more worst because that means there's more than just those two creepy fucks down here."

"Wally, what happened?" Hack asked the redhead, not sure how to take in the information he'd just learned.

"I don't know really. One minute I was standing and the next I was flying through the air and smacking my face on the floor. Then this dick was kicking me and making me run. Dammit, I think my nose is broken."

" _'This dick'_ just saved your worthless ass," Alfie shouted angrily. Getting up, he turned around to show them the back of his jeans. "Look what that fucker did to the my jeans! Am I just making it up now?"

Shining his flashlight, Hack and Wally examined the new flap on the back of Alfie's jeans. It was too large and precise to have been caused by getting caught on something and they exchanged uncertain glances before getting up to their feet. Hack started to put the glasses to his face and sniffed, making a face and holding them toward Wally.

"Oh fuck, that's gross. You know he pissed on these, right?" Hack told Alfie.

Wally snatched the glasses away. "I didn't piss on them. They just fell in my piss and besides, I wiped them off."

"Yeah, well not good enough."

"Why the fuck are we standing here arguing about pissing on a pair of glasses? Did you find Martin?" Alfie asked Hack.

"No idea where he's at. He refuses to answer when I call his name and did you guys feel that shit before?"

"Yeah, what the hell was that?" Wally asked.

"I don't know, but I don't like it. Especially not if you had a ghost attacking you."

Eyes widening, Alfie looked around. "Doesn't the stories say the ghosts were confined to cells or something? What if that sound was something that opened their doors?"

An uncomfortable silence befell them until a scream somewhere nearby made them jolt and look around anxiously.

"That has to be Martin," Hack said.

"Let's go," Alfie said, pausing to glare at Wally. "Together."

The fight having been taken out of him by recent events and the fact that he had only the option of standing here by himself with nowhere else to go, Wally nodded. Proceeding with caution, no one was comforted to turn down a corridor and find two open cells before them, their emptiness making the air tense as they proceeded past. There weren't many ways to go now, the corridors getting shorter and more straightforward. It wasn't long until they stepped into a large opening that seemed out of place. There were remnants here of a large machine that had long ago fell apart and across from that on the other side of the room, Martin sat on the floor with his knees tucked up to his chin. He stared off at nothing, eyes glazed over as he rocked back and forth ever so slightly. On his face was a pair of glasses similar to the ones Wally was now wearing.

"Martin, are you okay? What are you doing here?" Alfie asked, kneeling beside his friend. 

"Waiting for the lady," he answered calmly without moving.

"What lady?"

"The naked lady with the slashes all over her."

"That's not funny."

Martin didn't reply. It was Wally that suddenly jumped backward toward the machine, his eyes wide as he stared at something near Martin and Alfie.

"Dipshits, move!" he shouted, his voice cracking in his fear.

Slowly, Martin looked at his side, the one opposite of where Alfie knelt, and smiled as he craned his neck upward. "You found me," he said with all the glee of a child playing hide-and-seek.

Although Alfie and Hack were lost as to what was happening, Wally could only sputter, words unable to form on his lips as he watched a naked, bloodless woman kneel beside Martin. Her face and body a mess of angry red slashes that had long ago bled out until she was dry. Her hair had the appearance of being damp even though there was no possible way she had taken a shower in a long, long time. She had a knife in her hand that she brought to Martin's throat without hesitation and slit it deeply, black eyes boring into his still too wide ones. The smile never slipped off Martin's lips as his head tilted down slightly and he slowly choked to death on his own blood. Alfie swore loudly and fell backward away from the macabre sight before him, only able to see the bloody slit appear. Wally wanted to scream as he watched his friend die before his eyes, a smile still on Martin's lips before his head came to hang down to his knees, which, along with his arms, slowly slumped down until he was no longer moving at all.

Wally found his words as the ghost suddenly snapped her head up to look at him. "Run, dipshits! Run!" he screamed and bolted from the room blindly without a flashlight to help guide him.

Hack turned to run too as Alfie got to his feet quickly and, uncertain why he was doing it, quickly reached out to grab the glasses off of Martin's face. His reward for his effort was a deep slash along his arm, though he still managed to hook his fingers onto the arm of the glasses and pulled them off as he stumbled back. He was bleeding heavily now as he slipped on the glasses in time to see the woman lunge her knife at his throat. Because of his already uneven footing, he stumbled again, away from the knife, though it still grazed his jaw and ear. Not waiting another moment, Alfie was out of the room in a flash, pounding down the corridors after his friends.

He caught up with Hack, which was impressive considering Hack's athleticism, though Alfie's terror didn't afford him the opportunity to celebrate this achievement. Somewhere up ahead, they could hear Wally letting off a flood of colorful expletives until he suddenly fell silent. It was another moment before they found him and he was paler than normal, his freckles standing out against his skin; blood from his broken nose bright. Hack seemed lost as he swept the flashlight around. 

"What is it?" he asked.

"It's the guy from earlier," Alfie whispered, moving very slowly to point his flashlight at a spot a few feet away from them where the tall, bullet-riddled man stood. 

"I was running, but I lost my flashlight, you know when the other ghost threw me," Wally started babbling under his breath. "I slammed into something and realized it had to be another ghost because it sure as shit wasn't another wall but it didn't move and even with the glasses I couldn't see it in this darkness but now I can and fuck oh fuck man..."

He continued to babble as Alfie passed his glasses to Hack, who jumped and then frowned. "Why isn't he attacking?"

"I don't fucking know man but I'm too scared to move and I think I shit myself because fuck this man was a bad idea," Wally continued babbling, tears prickling his eyes.

"Chill out already," Hack hissed and took a step toward the ghost. "Maybe it won't--"

Without warning, he was slammed against the wall, his head bouncing hard enough to knock him out as he slid to the dirty floor. Alfie didn't want to leave his friend but he didn't think he could do anything for him, not with this particular ghost hovering somewhere nearby, so he yanked at Wally's arm, but the redhead refused to move. Trying again, yanking harder this time, he was thwarted when Wally suddenly rose into the air and Alfie knew that there was nothing he could do now for him either, not against a ghost.

So he ran. Alfie, with a heavy heart, turned and ran blindly through the dark with only the light of his flashlight to show him where he was heading but not pointing the way out of this nightmare maze. Somewhere behind him, Wally screamed and screamed as Alfie ran until his lungs burned and his legs threatened to collapse beneath him. He forced himself onward, propelled by fear as Wally's screams began to fade. At one point, he thought he recognized a corridor and turned down it, slowing down slightly but never stopping his feet. Okay, yes, this was beginning to look a lot like the corridor they had found Martin, a wet spot on the floor indicating where Wally had once stood, so that meant the way out wasn't far away. Jogging now, he followed the path the best he remembered it and breathed a heavy sigh of relief when he came into sight of the partial staircase. 

Moonlight spilled through the hole above and he stopped beneath it to catch his breath before attempting the climb up. He swept his flashlight around fruitlessly because if there was a ghost nearby, he wasn't going to be able to see it without the glasses on. Maybe that was for the best, he figured, because he didn't want to see anymore ghosts, ever again if he could manage it. Breath at a light pant now, he moved toward the staircase to get the hell out of there and paused when he heard something move nearby. Sweeping the flashlight around again, Alfie bewilderedly watched Hack emerge from the partially blocked corridor, just barely squeezing by the rubble and debris. Alfie was at his side in a heartbeat, helping the clearly injured man to his feet.

"I thought you were dead," Alfie said as Hack coughed.

"Just about feels that way," Hack grumbled, rubbing his head where he had hit it against the wall. 

"Where's Wally?"

At this, Hack made a face as he moved toward the staircase and sat on a step with a heavy cough. "He's dead. I woke up to find only bits and pieces of him nearby and that was it. Don't know where the ghost went either but I guess he went off to enjoy his kill or something."

"We need to get out of here."

"Yeah, but let my head stop throbbing so fucking much. It makes moving a bitch."

"Are we safe?" Alfie asked, looking around nervously.

Hack looked up before removing the glasses and holding them up to his friend. "Check for yourself."

Hesitantly taking them, Alfie slipped the glasses on and looked around, feeling sick to his stomach as he did so. All around them were ghosts, at least ten or so, possibly a few more, it was hard to tell properly because the sense of dread that filled him right then made him dizzy. He stepped back as he took in the grotesque and bloodied faces all around him; a screaming head in a bag at his feet making him jump. Alfie made to move up the staircase but bumped into something. Turning, he looked up at Hack who was blocking his path, a tight smile on his lips.

"Hack?"

"You know," Hack began, his voice monotonous now, "Wally was right about something."

"What?" Alfie asked, growing more confused by the nanosecond.

"My name. Of course my parents loved me, and they gave me a name to reflect that love, but it wasn't Hack."

Alfie didn't like where this was going and attempted to get by Hack, worried that his friend had hit his head too hard and was now out of his mind. Instead, Hack grabbed his arm and pushed him back, making him trip over the screaming head and fall onto his ass at the foot of the stairs. 

"My parents named me Robert Kriticos, Bobby for short, but that was a long time ago. That was before my mother died in a fire and my father tried to move into his recently deceased uncle's home. That was before I knew that ghosts were real and there were worst things than death out there to fear." Stepping down so he was standing over Alfie, the young man continued. "That was before my sister ended up in a sanatorium because she had become so terrified of everything that she couldn't function anymore.

My father did his best to act like he was fine with everything, but I finally found him with a gun in his mouth and his brains on a family picture of us about three years ago. So I came home, to the only place I knew couldn't condemn me or break me, because it had tried and I survived nonetheless where my family hadn't. Found some of my great-uncle's books, apparently the crazy fucker had a deep interest in the occult and black arts. So after some reading, I went ghost hunting and retrapped the souls that had escaped the night the house got destroyed - the night I survived - and put them back in their cells to test others. To make more survivors."

"What does this have to do with us?" Alfie asked, growing angry in his fear. "What did Wally and Martin and I do for you to think we deserved to be tested?"

Hack shrugged easily, a teasing smile forming on his lips. "You all agreed to come with me, that's all."

"This is insane. You're insane." Alfie got to his feet and shoved Hack aside, climbing up the stairs. "I'm getting the fuck out of here and you can play with your little ghosties alone."

"But you can't," Hack said, his voice too calm for comfort.

"Why not?"

"You failed the test. You're not a survivor."

"Fuck you, I'm still alive, aren't I? I'd say that counts pretty well for saying I survived."

"But you haven't earned that right. The night I survived, my father came to get me. He saved me from certain death at the very clear and direct threat of his own life."

"So?"

"When I banged my head back there before Wally got killed, you had a chance to save me. To at least rouse me from my unconsciousness and help me escape with you. Instead, you turned tail and ran, leaving me to die along with that idiot."

Alfie paled as he realized that Hack was right, however, he shook his head. "I made a mistake, but I don't apologize for trying to save my own ass. You would've done the same thing yourself."

"It's not about what I would've done, I wasn't the one taking a test here. You were," Hack sneered, still smiling. "Grades are in buddy, and you got an F."

Stepping to the side, Hack began to chant in latin. The ghosts reacted immediately as if they were puppets in some twisted puppet show and Hack's words were their strings. Turning, Alfie attempted to clamber up to safety, but because of the poor footing of his escape route, the ghosts were upon him too quickly, pulling him back down the stairs and to the floor. Blades and hands began to rip into the fresh body as Hack simply stood by, a twisted smile on his face, and watched on as Alfie began to scream his final screams. A woman in a hospital gown came to stand beside him, watching the scene unfold with sad eyes.

Above them, sitting at the edge of the hole was a small figure, roughly the size of a child. It was clad in what appeared to be orange pajamas, with a brown burlap sack over its head and dark button eyes sewed into it. It quietly watched the horror unfold below in a pleasant kind of silence, little legs swinging back and forth.

****

-End-


End file.
